□ And now we have been in the rain. She pulled her shirt off & ran before me up the slope, turning back to note how fast I followed, the eagerness of my address to this step of the operation. There was no measure to this time, no bounds to my eagerness, hence no measure of it, hence no seeming to run faster though I pursued. It was quiet … Read more Robert Kelly: An Alchemical Journal (2)
As promised —though delayed because of lack of internet connections in the Upper Pyrenees— here is the first installment of Robert Kelly’s An Alchemical Journal (first published in IO magazine #4, summer 1967 & reprinted in The Alchemist to Mercury, a collection of Kelly’s work edited by Jed Rasula in 1981. There will be about 10 installments to be published roughly one every second or third day. This schedule will be adhered to … Read more Robert Kelly: An Alchemical Journal
by Ali Bektaş [via RETORT where Iain Boal added this note: The text of this dispatch was received from Ali on 25.vii.14. It reflects the situation in Rojava during the third week of July. Apologies to AT for the delay in editing (23.viii.14). IB] Temmuz, 2014 A Turkish armored personnel carrier patrolling the zone separating the Kurds between Turkey and Syria (credit: Özgür Gündem) The struggle to abolish borders which separate peoples from … Read more The Struggle Against Borders and for Autonomy in Kurdistan
via the always excellent Arab Literature (in English): BY MLYNXQUALEY on AUGUST 24, 2014 • ( 0 ) Yesterday, ArabLit posted about a new Mohamed Choukri International Award while making only slight mention of the circumstances under which Choukri’s internationally acclaimed al-Khubz al-Hafi was translated into English. Indeed, calling it a translation is perhaps inaccurate: Addressing this issue is Nirvana Tanoukhi’s “Rewriting Political Commitment for an International Canon: Paul Bowles’s For Bread Alone as Translation of Mohamed Choukri’s Al-Khubz Al-Hafi” (2003). Any translation will differ from … Read more Translation and Expectation: Which ‘For Bread Alone’ Are You Reading?
Uri Avnery / August 23, 2014 Son of Death THE WAR was over. Families returned to their kibbutzim near Gaza. Kindergartens opened up again. A ceasefire was in force and extended again and again. Obviously, both sides were exhausted. And then, suddenly, the war came back. What happened? Well, Hamas launched rockets against Beersheba in the middle of the ceasefire. Why? No why. You know how the terrorists are. … Read more Uri Avnery: Son of Death
Via the always excellent Arab Literature (in English): BY MLYNXQUALEY on AUGUST 20, 2014 • ( 4 ) I don’t like you, death But I’m not afraid of you And I know that my body is your bed And my spirit is your bed cover I know that your banks are narrow for me I don’t love you, death But I’m not afraid of you.–One of Samih al-Qasim’s final poemsBeloved Palestinian poet Samih al-Qasim died … Read more Palestinian Poet Samih al-Qasim Dies at 75
“Rigwreck” – Gabriel Jackson (b. 1962, UK) The Crossing gives the world premiere of Gabriel Jackson’s “Rigwreck” on the third concert of our fifth annual Month of Moderns Festival at the Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill on June 30th, 2013. “Rigwreck” was commissioned as part of “The Gulf (between you and me),” a series of 3 works from 3 separate composers dealing with the BP Oil Spill Crisis in … Read more “Rigwreck”: Music by Gabriel Jackson; Poem by Pierre Joris
August 16, 2014 Eyeless in Gaza THE TROUBLE with war is that it has two sides. Everything would be so much easier if war had only one side. Ours, of course. There you are, drawing up a wonderful plan for the next war, preparing it, training for it, until everything is perfect. And then the war starts, and to your utmost surprise it appears that there is another side, … Read more Uri Avnery: Eyeless in Gaza
Press release by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research 08/12/2014 Weather extremes in the summer – such as the record heat wave in the United States that hit corn farmers and worsened wildfires in 2012 – have reached an exceptional number in the last ten years. Man-made global warming can explain a gradual increase in periods of severe heat, but the observed change in the magnitude and duration … Read more Trapped atmospheric waves triggered more weather extremes